The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Greene’s threat to oust Mike Johnson as House speaker falls flat
One Republican senator said Greene is ‘a total waste of time.’
For weeks, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene promised that if the House approved a package of military aid for Ukraine, she would rally fellow Republicans to get rid of House Speaker Mike Johnson.
But as $95 billion in aid for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan was receiving strong bipartisan support Tuesday in the Senate, the congresswoman from Rome had little to show for her attacks on GOP leaders, even as she continued her calls for Johnson’s resignation.
“It’s baffling hearing the establishment complain that it’s too much drama, too hard and too risky to go through another speaker race,” Greene said.
Greene finds herself in an unusual political place this week — at odds with former President Donald Trump, who didn’t stand in the way of these foreign aid bills and refused to join her crusade to get rid of Johnson, who is from Louisiana.
“I think he’s a very good person,” Trump said of Johnson in a radio interview Monday, noting the thin Republican majority in the U.S. House. “It’s not like he can go and do whatever he wants to do.”
But that line from Trump didn’t wash with one of Greene’s House allies.
“The weakest argument in defense of Speaker Johnson is ‘it’s a razor-thin majority; you can’t get everything you want,’” said U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., one of two GOP lawmakers supporting Greene’s call for Johnson to resign.
As senators returned Tuesday to vote on the aid bills, it was obvious just how isolated Greene is inside her own party.
“She’s a total waste of time,” U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., told CNN as GOP senators stood by the House speaker’s decision to allow a vote on aid for Ukraine.
“This is one of those gut-check issues,” said U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La.
“It wouldn’t have happened without Mike.”
Greene’s threats against Johnson escalated in the past six weeks as he agreed to bipartisan deals on two packages of government funding bills, a foreign intelligence surveillance bill, then the aid package.
But since House members went home Saturday, no other Republicans have stepped up to join Greene’s call for a GOP leadership shake-up.
“I think the timing of a motion to vacate is ill-timed,” said U.S. Rep. Andy Ogles of Tennessee, one of a number of Republicans voicing frustration about the speaker but not ready to do anything about it.
For Democrats, Greene offers both a target and a wedge inside the GOP.
“We overcame the propaganda of Marjorie Taylor Greene and other extremists,” said U.S. Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., as Democrats have celebrated the bipartisan support for this foreign aid package.
But that doesn’t mean Democrats want Greene to stop her GOP attacks.
“Nothing would make me happier than to see Congresswoman Greene continue to wage what looks to me to be a fruitless campaign to take down another speaker,” Democratic strategist Jim Manley said.